1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to devices and systems for cooling the air, and particularly to an evaporative cooler and pad in which the conventional evaporative cooler pads of wood fiber are replaced with evaporative cooler pads made of luffa sponge, and in which antifungal and antibacterial agents are added to the water used to wet the pads.
2. Description of the Related Art
A number of different principles for cooling air have been developed in the past. One of the earliest of those principles is the evaporative cooler, wherein water is passed through wet porous air filters and air is drawn through those filters. The moisture evaporates in the air as it is drawn through the filters. The air is cooled by the latent heat of evaporation absorbed from the air as the water changes phase from liquid to vapor. This principle works well in drier climates with relatively low ambient humidity, decreasing the temperature of the air passing through the cooler by perhaps as much as 15° C.
However, few improvements have been made to the evaporative cooling principle since its development. Relatively few materials have been developed for forming the porous pads, with those materials not necessarily being particularly efficient at distributing the moisture as fine droplets to promote evaporation. Moreover, such coolers by their nature contain relatively warm, moist components therein, which provide a near ideal site for the propagation of potentially harmful microbes, fungal spores, and the like. Also, many such coolers are constructed with the lower portion of the cooler shell forming a water reservoir. The water in the reservoir receives heat, not only from the ambient environment immediately outside the cooler, but also from the electric motor used to power the fan of the cooler. This water is passed through the filters for evaporation, but it will be seen that the use of relatively warm water in the evaporation cycle is not optimally efficient.
Thus, an evaporative cooler and pad solving the aforementioned problems is desired.